kojotutorial: another ruffle-y, jcrew-y dress

I know I’ve already given you the directions for the yellow ruffle dress. Just to cover all my bases, I thought I’d whip up a little tutorial for the green ruffle dress as well. You know, to be thorough. And to make sure that those of you who can’t wait until the end of November to see if you’ve won one of these babies have all the information you require to make your own. I’m nice like that.

Also, you’ll notice that I didn’t sew the armholes for this dress, which makes it just the teensiest bit less labor intensive than the yellow one. Perhaps you can use your extra 10 minutes to make yourself a warm cup of chai tea (or a salted caramel apple- YUM!). 🙂

Anyhow, to make this other ruffle dress you’ll need:
-an old tshirt (men’s large)
-some ribbon (1 yard)
-a 2T sized dress to use as a tracing template (of course, modify the sizing as needed)
-scissors
-a fabric pen
-a pom pom maker
-thread and a sewing machine

1. I traced the ‘template dress’ onto the tshirt using a fabric pen. I folded the template dress in half, traced it onto the tshirt (also folded in half) and cut everything out folded in half so that everything would be symmetrical. When I cut, I left a little fabric (maybe half an inch) around the entire perimeter to account for sewing later.

5. Next, I sewed a little ribbon casing across the neckline. After threading a ribbon through the casing and matching the ribbon up to the template dress to check on sleeve length, I sewed the ribbon together. Then I shimmied the sewed part into the ribbon casing so the sewn edge isn’t visible. Stitching along the edges so the ribbon sleeves stay put makes it so that the finished product doesn’t droop in the front with the weight of the ruffles.

7. The base of the dress is finished! Now to the ruffle-ing… This dress is a little different than the first ruffle dress in the addition of pom poms to the ruffles. To make the pom poms, cut long, thin strips from the tshirt. Use a pom pom maker to turn those strips into little balls of tshirt-y goodness that can adorn the centers of your ruffles. I’ve said this before, but it bears repeating: If you don’t have a pom pom maker, get one. Seriously. It’s worth it.

8. Make 4 tshirt pom poms and 4 ruffles. To make a basic ruffle, I used a stack of three circles (cut from the same tshirt I used for the dress) and puckered as I went using a needle and thread. For this dress, I added the pom pom to the center of the ruffle and just stitched it in place as I was puckering and stitching. That sounds kind of funny, and it took a little getting used to, but it worked. I then stitched these flower ruffles across the top of the front neckline using green thread.

9. Make one final pom-pom-y ruffle, attach it to a ribbon that matches the ‘sleeves’ and you have yourself a belt. Put the dress (and the belt) on your impossibly cute niece and send her off amongst the pumpkins to be her adorable self! Enjoy!